Australia's Tommy Emmanuel will perform in downtown Ha Noi on October 21. — Photo misterguitar.us

HA NOI (VNS) — One of the world's best fingerstyle guitarists, Australia's Tommy Emmanuel, will perform in downtown Ha Noi on October 21.

His show in Viet Nam is part of a series of nine shows that will also be held in Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan and mainland China.

Fingerstyle is a technique of playing the guitar by plucking the strings with the fingertips, fingernails or picks attached to fingers, as opposed to flatpicking (picking individual notes with a single plectrum called a flatpick).

The style has become more and more popular in Viet Nam in recent years.

Emmanuel was born in Australia in 1955. He received his first guitar in 1959 at the age of four, and was taught by his mother to accompany her in playing lap steel guitar.

At the age of seven in 1961, he heard a young Chet Atkins playing on the radio. He vividly remembers this moment and says it greatly inspired him.

By then, he was a professional musician. Recognising the musical talents of Tommy and his older brother Phil Emmanuel, their father created a family band, sold the family home and took his family on the road. With the family living in two station wagons, much of Emmanuel's childhood was spent touring Australia with them, playing rhythm guitar and rarely going to school. The family found it difficult living on the road. They were poor but never hungry, and never settling in one place. His father would often drive ahead, organise interviews, advertising and finding a local music shop where they would have an impromptu concert the next day.

Throughout his career he has played with many notable artists such as Chet Atkins, Eric Clapton, Sir George Martin and Air Supply, as well as John Denver, Les Paul, Edgar Cruz and Martin Taylor, besides Doc Watson.

Tommy is currently a resident of Nashville.

In 2015, he announced the formation of his own record label, CGP Sounds.

Emmanuel was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in June 2010.

Due to his virtuoso status and dissemination of the "fingerstyle" method of guitar playing, the Commonwealth of Kentucky and Governor Steve Beshear awarded Emmanuel the state's highest honour, the Kentucky Colonel title, in 2012. The fingerstyle method originated in Northwestern Kentucky and was pioneered by Merle Travis.

Emmanuel will perform at Tuoi Tre (Youth) Theatre, 11 Ngo Thi Nham Street, Ha Noi, from 8pm on October 21. — VNS